An Independent Central Bank is often associated with being able to achieve low inflation and greater output stability than government run policies. In this paper we examine whether, and under what circumstances, an independent Central Bank can achieve both these targets with only one policy...

Do politics matter for macroprudential policy? I show that changes to macroprudential regulation exhibit a predictable electoral cycle in the run-up to 221 elections across 58 countries from 2000 through 2014. Policies restricting mortgages and consumer credit are systematically less likely to...